T. B. Harms & Francis, Day & Hunter, Inc.

T.B. Harms & Francis, Day, & Hunter, Inc., based in the Tin Pan Alley area of New York City, was, in 1920, one of the seven largest publishers of popular music in the world. As evidence of size of the firm, T.B. Harms & Francis, Day & Hunter, Inc. was one of seven defendants named in a 1920 in a Sherman antitrust suit brought by the US Justice Department for controlling 80% of the music publishing business.^[1] The seven defendants were:

Consolidated Music Corporation – 144 W. 37th St., New York, NY
Irving Berlin, Inc. – 1567 Broadway, New York, NY
Leo Feist, Inc. – 231 W 40th St, New York, NY
T.B. Harms & Francis, Day & Hunter, Inc. – 62 W. 45th St., New York, NY
Shapiro, Bernstein & Co., Inc. – 218 W. 47th St., New York, NY
Watterson, Berlin & Snyder, Inc. – 1571 Broadway, New York, NY (sold in bankruptcy to Mills Music in 1929)
M. Witmark & Sons, Inc. – 144 W. 37th St, New York, NY

Founded in 1881 as the Thomas B. Harms Music Publishing Company,^[2] T.B. Harms & Francis, Day & Hunter, Inc., was eventually incorporated in the State of New York and changed its name to Harms, Inc. in 1921.^[3]

Owners & executives

Thomas B. Harms (1860-1906)
Max Dreyfus (1874-1964) (owned 25% in 1901) — The Harms empire owned or backed by Dreyfus, included Harms, Inc., Chappell-Harms (its "repository for non-production music"), De Sylva, Brown, and Henderson, Remick Music, Green and Stept, Famous Music, T. B. Harms, "and George Gershwin's New World Music, publisher of all Gershwin's music" (109).
Jerome Kern (1885-1945) — Kern plugged sheet music at a local department store then took a job with T.B. Harms, Inc., and eventually became vice president.
Alexander T. Harms (1855-1901)
Frederick Day (1878-1975)

History timeline

1875	Brothers Alexander T. Harms (b. 20 Feb 1856 New York City; d. 23 Oct 1901 New York City) and Thomas B. Harms (b. 5 Jan 1860 New York City; d. 28 March 1906 New York City) founded in 1875 what many consider to be one of the first American firms of music publishers. T.B. Harms & Co. sold contemporary popular music, and the success of such early publications as When the Robins Nest Again (1883) and The Letter That Never Came (1886) led other Tin Pan Alley publishers to emulate the firm’s promotional activities
1901	Max Dreyfus (b. 1 April 1874 Kuppenheim; d. 12 May 1964 Brewster, NY), who had been working for Harms as an arranger, bought a 25% interest in the firm
1903	Dreyfus employed Jerome Kern as a composer
1904	Dreyfus bought out the Harms brothers, but retained the name – T.B. Harms & Co., Inc. – turning it into one of the most prestigious popular music publishers in Tin Pan Alley. Dreyfus discovered, recruited, and promoted Jerome Kern, George Gershwin, Vincent Youmans, Richard Rodgers, and Cole Porter. In time, the firm would publish about 90 percent of all Broadway scores and show tunes
1908	the British firm Francis, Day, and Hunter entered into a partnership with T.B. Harms, in which Max and his brother, Louis, ended up owning two-thirds of the business and Fred Day one-third
1917	songwriter Jerome Kern purchased a quarter share in the firm
1920	William Boosey and Chappell and Company, both of London, offered to purchase and operate the New York division of T.B. Harms & Francis, Day, & Hunter, Inc. Day sold out and returned to London. Louis took over Chappell New York. Max became the manager of the newly named Harms, Inc.
1927	Max Dreyfus made a deal with George and Ira Gershwin to form a subsidiary, "New World Music Corporation" to hold their copyrights, with Harms owning a large stake.
1929	Dreyfus sold his interest in the company to Warner Brothers, who reorganized it as "Music Publishers Holding Corporation." Dreyfus stayed on as a consultant until he set up in 1935 the American branch of Chappell, a company affiliated with Chappell of London, owned by his brother Louis Dreyfus (1877–1967). In 1969 that part of Harms connected with the estates of Louis Dreyfus (who had been a director of Harms) and Kern was bought by Lawrence Welk and became part of the Welk Music Group.^[4]^[5]

Tin Pan Alley publisher

"Tin Pan Alley" was a specific area in New York City on 28th Street, between Broadway and 6th Avenue that, at the turn of the 20th century, was the epicenter of the popular music publishing industry. Many publishing firms were not actually located on that particular block, but, "Tin Pan Alley" was also as much a reference to a music industry district as it was to a music genre (popular music, ragtime – the precursor to what became jazz). T.B. Harms & Francis, Day, & Hunter, Inc. was a Tin Pan Alley firm.

Sale to Warner Brothers

As silent pictures evolved to talkies, Warner Brothers had aimed to build its inventory of published music. Before the Stock Market Crash of 1929, Warner Brothers acquired Harms, Inc., using 140,364 shares of its own stock, then valued at $8,421,840. Warner then reincorporated its acquisition under the laws of Delaware and named it Music Publishers Holding Company, Inc. That same year (1929), Warner Brothers also had acquired the music publishing company of M. Witmark & Sons.^[6]

References

↑ Music Publishers Sued Here As Trust, The New York Times, Aug. 4, 1920
↑ Cockrell, Dale and Andrew M. Zinck, Popular Music of the Parlor and Stage, pgs. 179–201, in the Garland Encyclopedia of World Music
↑ New Incorporations, The New York Times, March 31, 1921
↑ S.N. Behrman, Profiles, New Yorker Magazine, pgs. 20–24, Feb 6, 1932
↑ David A. Jasen, Tin Pan Alley, New York (1988)
↑ Warner Brothers Get Music Concern, The New York Times, Aug. 15, 1929

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Friday, November 27, 2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.